this post was submitted on 10 Sep 2024
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submitted 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) by Lauchs to c/asklemmy
 

Almost everyone agrees there should be more compromises in politics. So I'm curious, how would that play out?

While I love the policy debates and the nuances, most people go for the big issues. So, according to the party platforms/my gut, here's what I'd put as the 3 for each party:

Democrats: Abortion rights, gun control, climate change.

Republicans: Immigration, culture war (say, critical race theory in schools or gender affirming care for minors) , trump gets to be president. (Sorry but it really seems like a cult of personality at this point.)

Anyway, here's the exercise: say the other side was willing to give up on all three of their issues but you had to give up on one of your side's. OR, you can have two of your side's but have to give up on the third.

Just curious to see how this plays out. (You are of course free to name other priorities you think better represent the parties but obviously if you write "making Joe Pesci day a national holiday" as a priority and give it up, that doesn't really count.)

Edit: The consensus seems to be a big no to compromise. Which, fair, I imagine those on the Right feel just as strongly about what they would call baby murdering and replacing American workers etc.

Just kind of sad to see it in action.

But thanks/congrats to those who did try and work through a compromise!

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[–] [email protected] 44 points 2 months ago (3 children)

Call me naive or stubborn but these aren't points I would compromise at all with.

Abortion rights: People have the right to bodily autonomy. Anything less means that you don't own yourself.

Gun Control: People have a right to live safely and without fear or going to school to be shot up or at the mall. The fact that gun violence and school shootings are a regular occurrence is not a good thing.

Climate Change: Every single scientist is literally saying the next few decades will see some of the worst weather patterns in human history and that's even if we go to 0 emissions starting tomorrow. This will affect humanity on a global scale and cause unprecedented population displacement and suffering.

Any compromise on any of these posts means you are causing some kind of demographic to suffer and die simply to appease the egos of individuals who lack empathy.

[–] Meltrax 22 points 2 months ago (2 children)

The sad hilariousness of this really comes into play when you look at the compromises of the opposite three points that OP suggested. If I try to do the same style of justification explanations you gave as to why those would be uncompromisable:

Immigration: people have a right to... Jobs? (Firmly debunked that immigrants are "taking American jobs"). People have a right to not have to see non-Americans in "their" country?

Culture war: people have a right to... Ignore racism? People have a right to be as ignorant as they please? People have a right to be saved from others confirming their sexual identity and feeling peer pressure to do the same?

Trump gets to be president: people have a right to... Fascist leadership if they willingly elect it? People deserve the "best president ever"?

It's absurd that these are political issues if you take a half a step back and examine the 6 points in isolation. 3 of them are concerned with individuals making their own choices or the safety of humanity as a whole. 3 of them are about nationalism or controlling information and education, basically the definition of "putting myself and my beliefs above the rights of others". How the hell did we even get into a situation where this is what we are choosing between? Or rather, a situation where roughly half our country actually thinks this is a choice and not just blatantly obvious based on basic morality.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 months ago (5 children)

Oh yeah, I 100% agree with you. I don't know what OP was thinking when making this post and listing those points.

How the hell did we even get into a situation where this is what we are choosing between? Or rather, a situation where roughly half our country actually thinks this is a choice and not just blatantly obvious based on basic morality.

Easy, we compromised :). We said ok we'll meet you halfway on things that are absolutely crucial to humans rights for the sake of progress. Over the decades the right got more and more extreme as we continued compromising. It's not just in the US. I see it here in Canada as well. I really hate it.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

Lol that’s what I noticed too.

One side wants less people to die, the other side wants fascism and racism. Please help me compromise.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

This is why they're known as wedge issues because there's no compromise.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Aren't wedge issues for stuff that are divisive for a group of people who usually agree on most things? Something like the effective tax rates for billionaires among democrats.

[–] Lauchs 2 points 2 months ago
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[–] Lightor 21 points 2 months ago (1 children)

There is no room for a discussion. It's like one side saying "kill everyone" and the other side is saying "let's not kill people" then people are like "well, let's compromise and kill just some people, it's only fair." No, I'm done. Democrats have been way too tame and compromising for too long, I'm done entertaining this BS.

[–] Lauchs 5 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Ironically, that is almost exactly how the pro-life movement feels about abortion.

[–] Lightor 13 points 2 months ago (15 children)

I'm sure they do. But the thing is science at stats don't back their stance.

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[–] FourPacketsOfPeanuts 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Sad you're downvoted for pointing out the truth, it's not even your opinion!

[–] Anticorp 4 points 2 months ago

Welcome to Lemmy! Downvotes will be your guide.

[–] Contramuffin 15 points 2 months ago

If there was something I give up on, it's gun control. For several reasons:

  1. There's basically no gun control anyways so it's not like we're giving up something.
  2. Compared to abortion rights (ie bodily autonomy) and climate change (ie existential crisis), not having gun control is the least bad. It's still pretty crucial, to be fair, but comparing to actual existential crises like the other 2, not having gun control doesn't seem that bad in comparison
[–] [email protected] 14 points 2 months ago

I don't pander to fascists. None.

[–] thouartfrugal 12 points 2 months ago (3 children)

Do you consider yourself a partisan? The pervasive notion that there are "two sides" and you must be on one of them, it results in ordinary citizens viewing one another with suspicion and fear. It's a useful lie that serves the interests of those who would foster division in order to maintain the cultural status quo.

Not calling you out in particular. Just that I think about this every time something is posted that perpetuates this false "our team, their team" narrative because it's a powerful, insipid tool of oppression against the common person. True, people differ on contentious issues, sometimes irreconcilably. But if we are made to view one another as dyed-in-the-wool adversaries over that, we will fail to discover our common interests much less promote them through solidarity.

Not denying that the two major political parties in the United States do hold seemingly unassailable dominance in major elections like the one we're entering, largely due to determining winner by first-past-the-post. And yes, sadly it's very often the case that a meaningful vote will support one of those parties. But it doesn't have to be this way forever. In fact, I will be able to vote for city office candidates by ranked choice starting this year!

Sorry for the rant. Not an expert. Just a dude who wants to love his neighbor.

[–] PM_Your_Nudes_Please 4 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Just a dude who wants to love his neighbor.

And the big issue seems to be that the two sides have drastically different definitions of the word “love”. There was a study a while ago, which found that conservatives are more likely to have liberal friends, while liberals are less likely to have conservative friends. It sounds odd on the surface… But the reality is that if a liberal hangs out with conservatives long enough to become friends, those conservatives will eventually get comfortable. Comfortable enough to start using hard slurs, or they will call the liberal “one of the good ones” as if it’s a compliment.

It’s no wonder that liberals are less likely to report having conservative friends. Liberals have tried, and have been burned by all of the conservatives that they got close to. Meanwhile, the most offensive thing a liberal does around conservatives is just… Exist? Relatively speaking, it’s easy for a conservative to keep liberals around, because the liberal isn’t constantly trying to undermine the conservative’s right to personhood. Whether or not you can own guns isn’t an immediate existential threat to a conservative.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I'm fine with getting rid of the immigrants in America but it has to be all immigrants. European, every body. Got to get a visa from the native peoples if you want to stay and work. Hopefully they reject the racists.

[–] spankmonkey 5 points 2 months ago

If you look back far enough the native peoples are immigrants.

Not that I'm opposed to an entire continent being free of humans altogether.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago

Human rights are not a compromise. I will not even entertain the idea of compromising those. Abortion rights stay.

Gun control is an iffy one. It really should be fixed, but it will take decades of continuing reforms and filtering firearms out of the market to really get it to where it should be. On a short term basis, "compromising" (but not giving up) on this would be OK.

Climate change will obviously just kill us all, soooo...

In a keep two, give one scenario to shut Republicans up for an election cycle, it would be safe to compromise on gun control in exchange for cementing proper human rights and getting meaningful climate action.

[–] givesomefucks 7 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Almost everyone agrees there should be more compromises in politics

Bullshit.

Republicans want to "compromise" by getting everything they want.

Moderates politicians want "compromise" by giving them half and telling progressives to be happy Republicans only get half.

So most politicians say they want compromise, but I'd have to see a source for "almost everyone" saying it. Most voters don't want compromise.

[–] Lauchs 2 points 2 months ago

I mean, if you look at the responses in this thread, most folks have put their compromise as getting everything they want on the Dem side of things...

Though, you're not entirely wrong on the compromise thing. It's one of those things people say they want until they realize that means giving up on what they want. You might enjoy this old 538 article about it, which has this painful pair of paragraphs on the subject:

But how much does bipartisanship actually matter to voters? Americans have long said they prefer that the parties work together, and respondents in Morning Consult’s poll were no different. For instance, 85 percent of voters said it was very or somewhat important for legislation to have bipartisan support, 69 percent agreed that policies with bipartisan backing were the best policies, and 62 percent disagreed with the idea that it was a waste of time for politicians to seek bipartisan support. What’s more, there were no meaningful differences between how Democrats and Republicans answered these questions.

However, polls also show that many Americans are willing to scrap bipartisanship if it means passing legislation that their party prefers. For instance, a 2019 poll from the Pew Research Center found that despite majorities of Democrats (69 percent) and Republicans (61 percent) saying it was very important that elected officials be willing to compromise, members of both parties thought it was more important for officials from the other party to compromise than it was for officials from their own party to do so. Seventy-nine percent of Democrats thought it was very important for Republican lawmakers to compromise compared with just 41 percent of Republicans. Likewise, 78 percent of Republicans thought it was very important for Democratic lawmakers to compromise compared with 48 percent of Democrats.

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-much-do-americans-really-care-about-bipartisanship/

[–] Anticorp 7 points 2 months ago (3 children)

I am willing to compromise and allow trial by combat to be reintroduced as a valid judicial process. The only caveat is that the wealthy cannot appoint champions to fight for them.

Seriously though, I'm not in love with either party. Honestly, there are things I despise about both. Most Americans are pretty middle of the road. It's the extremists and the parties holding the country hostage, not the American people.

[–] Lauchs 3 points 2 months ago

Ahaha, I really enjoy this comment.

I think you're right, most folks are middle of the road but damned if I can think of a way to get the middle to actually dominate politics...

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago

I'd give up any and every gun point in favor of police reform, proper election and transition of power legislation, and climate change.

[–] JubilantJaguar 4 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Great question. Democracy is all about compromise. I am bothered by how few people seem to grasp this fact. Personally, when I hear the phrase "squabbling politicians", I roll my eyes - to squabble is their job! They're doing it on our behalf because people have different interests and different values and so we don't all agree, and that is a good thing. A polity where everybody agrees - well, there are names for that kind of political system and none of them are democracy.

Over here in Europe, I just wish the progressive parties (for whom I vote) would do the obvious deal and sacrifice their dilatory approach to immigration and in particular border security. This issue is undermining all their other policy goals. The obvious allergy of voters to porous borders is not just a result of disinformation, and taking a tougher line on it does not necessarily mean infringing human rights.

[–] Lauchs 3 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I am bothered by how few people seem to grasp this fact.

Yeah, some of the responses in this thread have been predictable but still disheartening.

would do the obvious deal and sacrifice their dilatory approach to immigration and in particular border security.

100%. It just seems like the progressives are losing the war for the sake of being in the moral feel good category, witness the rise of the Far Right in Poland, Germany, France and probably others that I'm too ignorant to know about (sorry!) That being said, reading over this thread and you can kind of see why the Progressive parties are in a bit of a bind, we do seem allergic to the notion that we might not get everything we want.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

How many queer people deaths are ok for you? How many women dying during childbirth are you willing to give up on for your compromise? The only thing politicians compromise on is whose pockets get lined more. Compromise on rights for others is a very privileged position to be in.

[–] JubilantJaguar 2 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Indeed. The moral purity issue has always been the Achilles heel of progressive politics. It makes compromise hard and it drives heretics - i.e. the people whose votes you need - crazy.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (2 children)

The problem here, what do you mean by compromise?

Like, those may be comparatively low on your personal agenda, which is fine. But there's still going to be some end result of a compromise.

Personally, I find the Democratic more-restrictive position on firearms to be one of the biggest turn-offs about the party. I think that there's constant pressure to try to erode a constitutional right there in a way that wouldn't be tolerated for other rights. My own view is that if the goal is to restrict the Second Amendment, you have to do so via constitutional amendment, and you have to have a serious conversation about the design and intent of the thing that's a lot deeper and inclusive of the reasons that the right was written into the Constitution than something like "you don't need a large magazine to hunt deer" or some other really shallow stuff like that. It hasn't been particularly prominent at the national level for a couple of decades, but it's always there at a low level, and "if the Democrats get enough political power, are they going to go adopt gun policy that I find highly objectionable" is one of my major personal concerns. So, okay, I'm with you on saying that in my personal ideal world, there'd be more concessions on firearms policy.

But...there are also policies that I wouldn't agree with as to firearms.

So...when one says "compromise", what are you looking to see compromise on? Like, it makes a big difference.

Like, I'd probably be at least willing to at least discuss having a ban on handguns, as long as it went through via constitutional amendment. Handguns are the most-commonly-owned form of firearm in the US, represent over half of the firearms in the US. Canada does something like this, is more-restrictive of handguns. Handguns are associated with a lot of crime, and probably the least-useful for the sort of concerns that the Founders had; ensuring that political power remained with the public. On the other hand, I think that the GCA requiring a (deniable) federal license for automatic weapons should not have passed constitutional examination. I would personally be willing to swap the two policies. I am also very confident that there are people who feel the exact opposite way about the two policies and favor the status quo, would be worried about wider availability of automatic weapons but are determined to have the ability to carry a comfortable-to-keep-with-oneself weapon at hand.

Or take climate change. I think that there's a pretty good case that the world is better off with less carbon emissions. I also think that a lot of number of objectionable policies have been passed using "climate change" as a really broad defense. To take one example, corn ethanol probably doesn't do much to reduce carbon emissions. It does mean that some states in the central US that benefit more from agriculture can get subsidies that one can sell to people on the coasts who are worried about climate change. I don't think that corn ethanol is really defensible, at least on the grounds on which it was sold, and I am generally not really happy with people hauling out "climate change" as a magic wand to defend a lot of policies when people start asking about the economics or other issues. But I also don't think that just ignoring carbon emissions is going to be a good move, not unless we have very solid and successful geoengineering work done and believe that it's just more-efficient to pull carbon out of the atmosphere, one way or another, via iron fertilization of plankton or what-have-you. So...sure, there are concessions in the area of climate change that I'd like to see made. But I don't know if I can say that I'd like to see concessions in all areas of climate change made.

In general, on the topics you listed:

  • Gun rights. I'm generally more-in-line with the Republican position on this. I think that most gun control moves bump up against constitutionality concerns. I think that it's rare that I'd favor a position popular with the Democratic side of the aisle than the Republican side of the aisle, and on some points, I'd probably push more towards gun rights side of the spectrum than the Republican mainstream would.

  • Abortion rights. Personally, I think that the ability to have an abortion is probably a good idea. I'm concerned about the fertility rate dropping to the levels that it has, but I'm skeptical that restricting abortions is anywhere near the top of the list as to how one might address that. I'd support having abortions be an option. On the other hand, I don't feel that Roe v. Wade was defensible on constitutional grounds; I think that it was driven by SCOTUS at the time feeling that it was a good policy, rather than that it was legitimately a right guaranteed by the Constitution. I think that that's the wrong way to go about adding rights -- you need an amendment for that -- and I'm fine with it having been overturned. I also think that restricting abortion smashes into practicality grounds even if one felt that it was a desirable policy; it's just too easy to cross state boundaries. I kind of feel that maybe the father should have some kind of say as to abortions; while the mother has the physical impact of giving birth, both parents have very large legal obligations to raise a child and I think that that outweighs the bearing and birthing. Maybe if either parent wants to have an abortion, an abortion should be done, which would be an even lower bar for abortions than is the case today.

  • Climate change. I think that carbon emissions are a real issue that can't be ignored, but, as I said above, can also list a number of policies that were put through using "climate change" as a rationale that I don't think are defensible.

  • Immigration. I think that more immigration is virtually always a win for the US. There may be a limit, but it's higher than what the US has experienced and certainly higher than present-day levels, which are historically low as a percentage of population. Immigration has been a colossal reason for the US's rise in the world. I think that the concerns about immigration are not new, have been replayed for centuries, and are not really defensible given historical evidence. I also don't think that the Republican Party is particularly interested in dramatically bringing down immigration, though Republican voters might be and the GOP might be very interested in visibly flailing away at it for political points.

  • Culture war. I very rarely agree with conservative positions on culture issues, but I also have a great dislike for using the government to promote progressive positions, and have quite a bit of sympathy when I hear conservatives complain that someone is trying to leverage the government to do so. I think that the government shouldn't really act as a cultural arbiter. One of my strongest disagreements with some people on some Lemmy communities that I frequent has been people who think that they need to use the government to just make people think "correctly" on some matters. I'd ask them, if they want to institutionalize that, what exactly they think is going to happen if someone who they disagree with comes into power?

  • Trump. I don't like Trump. However, I am not at all worried about national policy in a second Trump administration; I think that there are a lot of folks on the left side of the aisle who have worked themselves into an absolute frenzy completely disconnected from reality over that, and I'm constantly rolling my eyeballs when I see someone get frantic about a "fascist takeover" or the like. We've seen Trump in office for four years. From a policy standpoint, it isn't all that exciting. Hell, if Biden were still running, we'd have one of the most unsurprising elections in American history -- two people who have a four-year track record as President and are very much known quantities running against each other. No, my objections to Trump are to him as an individual...first and foremost, he personally tried to leverage undermining the political legitimacy of an election where he had no grounds to stand on at all to try to score points in the next election. Even absent everything else, for me, that alone should disqualify the guy from holding office. I don't want to start a trend of people doing that. I am unhappy with all of the messages he puts out, don't think that they're a good look for the country. I am not happy with his practice of being totally self-inconsistent as to policy. I want there to be dialog on positions, and Trump doesn't bother to maintain a coherent set of positions. That makes it really hard for democratic dialog to happen, if you can't pin down what someone is actually proposing doing. I am not happy with some of his actions in office, like Comey being dismissed.

    However, I also don't think that asking for concessions on Trump makes much sense. Trump ain't the problem here. Trump is the symptom. If our electoral system, mechanisms of political discourse, media, stuff like that permit for the actions he's taken to work and to appeal to the public, that's where the problem lies and that's where change needs to happen. Removing Trump from the picture is a one-off. If what Trump has done works well, someone else can do the same thing. I don't particularly want some other guy to do the same thing that Trump has and get into office.

Not everyone is gonna agree with my personal positions. But I think that virtually everyone out there has a more nuanced position on most policy matters than just "pro" or "con". So it's hard to just say "concede" on a broad policy area like that.

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[–] dustyData 3 points 2 months ago

Compromise can only exist when there's at least one coincidence of interest. A greater good or similar common value that motivates the parties to negotiate over the aisle on individual issues. The principles, values, goals and even worldview of the two party system in the US is radically polarized. Which makes it almost impossible to negotiate a compromise. Right now, the few policy issues they agree on are nonessential points (supporting Israel, e.g.) that don't weight the balance and exist out of pure accident. It exist on either side for completely different reasons. When one side argues that some people deserves to die, it is hard to negotiate when the protection of life and dignity is above all for the other side. But compounded by the fact that they don't even agree what life, person hood and dignity even mean.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

The Dems really should give up the party line on gun control. Red flag laws make a lot of sense, but bans on specific weapons are unpopular,
Ineffective, unworkable, and almost certainly unconstitutional.

[–] Lauchs 2 points 2 months ago

That's fair. I come at guns with my weird Canadian perspective but I do think different classes of weapons is reasonable. Here, rifles are treated vwry differently from handguns which are basically allowed in a locked storage box at home (with ammo in, if I remember my firearms license training correctly, another locked box) or in the trunk of your car while you are on the most direct route to a firing range or coming home from one.

We have almost no gun crime. In America, I've had guns drawn on me twice by cops (understandably nervous cops, I would be nervous too if everyone had a handgun!) after being pulled over for speeding and one time a dude I met at a Sharks game pulled one on a guy who threatened us with a knife.

That just seems like a ridiculous way to live. I've had a blast shooting off guns in the bush, drunk and high in Oregon but as much fun as that was, definitely doesn't outweigh the whole "guns are just around and yeah, school shootings happen" thing.

[–] Blackbeard 2 points 2 months ago

Just wanted to direct folks to [email protected], which is a brand new community for exactly these kinds of discussions. Cheers!

[–] spankmonkey 2 points 2 months ago

Guns: A well regulated militia includes gun registration and training requirements. The fear based self defense justification is a bunch of baloney. The compromise is being able to keep guns if you are part of that well regulated militia, which should probably require not being a violent felon along with guns being taken away for other people's safety, like when domestic violence allegations are involved.

Abortion rights: A woman and a doctor decide when and how she has an abortion. Since a doctor already has an oath to life, they won't abort a viable and healthy fetus anyway so they can compromise on how that situation works out.

I don't really have anything to compromise on with Republicans because they oppose basic rights that impact no one else, and compromising rights is only necessary when the impact the rights of others.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago (4 children)

I'm Canadian so I'm not a voter in the contest you're presenting, but if I were I would vote Democrat. And of the trio you present for the Democrats, I would say that the position I'd compromise on would be gun control. Not because American gun culture isn't bananas and it's not a serious problem, but because I can't see any plausible way to fix it in the short term. So might as well let it go for now and deal with the more important stuff that affects more people.

I think a more reasonable compromise would be to give Republicans most of what they want on immigration reform. That seems to be something they consider to be of critical importance, but that I think can be allowed without it causing significant harm. If the American economy starts to suffer as a result of not having illegal immigrant workers then that will be motivation for further reforms. I think it's important to have the laws try to reflect the realities, though, and having the economy literally depend on large-scale lack of adherence to the law of the land is a bad place to be. Just make sure not to be monstrous about it - don't do the concentration-camps-for-children thing, try to maintain basic asylum access for those who truly need it, and so forth.

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[–] Zonetrooper 2 points 2 months ago

I'm afraid you're not likely to get many actual answers on Lemmy. The politics here can be wildly, wildly skewed, and it doesn't generally create a conducive environment to calm, rational discussions. (In fairness, I'm not sure if any other site really does support truly balanced political discussion either.) I admire your attempt, however.

Another issue (which some others have already commented on) is what constitutes a "compromise". For instance, if I have four issues which left and right-wing movements are at odds over, is it "compromise" if for each of the two I decide to go with a strongly left- or right-wing position? Or is it only compromise if for all positions we take a moderate position which cleaves to neither bloc's position?


Anyhow, let me at least try to answer. Though I lean more left, I still find myself out of line with both major parties on some issues. For example: In the interests of addressing climate change and achieving stronger energy reliability and independence, I favor a drive to increase, not remove, hydroelectric dams and nuclear power facilities in the country.

[–] RBWells 2 points 2 months ago

Wait, you are saying we can have comprehensive environmental restoration and an honest fight vs. climate change if one of the other two is given up?

Gun control for sure for me. Enforce the laws we have, though.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

I'd give up gun control for America to no longer be allied with Israel.

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